


4,564 km

by isuilde



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Future Fic, Get Together, M/M, Unrepentant Fluff, background Victor/Yuuri - Freeform, bike roadtrip, pining!Otabek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-05
Updated: 2018-05-05
Packaged: 2019-05-02 08:20:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14540604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isuilde/pseuds/isuilde
Summary: The distance between Almaty and St. Petersburg spreads for 4,564 kilometers. Otabek finds out that it’s just enough for Yuri to learn about being in love.(or: Otabek pines, and Yuri drags him for a motorbike roadtrip.)





	4,564 km

**Author's Note:**

> Sold for the YOI only @ OTPcon 2017. Check out the gorgeous cover art by @andykuzuki on Twitter [over here, it’s super pretty!!](https://twitter.com/andykuzuki/status/836740445539553280?s=21)

Here’s the thing: _The Motorcycle Diaries_ has always been Otabek’s most favorite movie.

Look, it’s a great movie. Not just because it’s a motorbike roadtrip movie, but also because it’s a memoir. Otabek does have a thing about memoir films, especially those with coming-of-age stories, and well, _The Motorcycle Diaries_ has a bit of all of those things: adventure, youthful hedonism, and portrayals of harsh realities that had planted the seeds of revolution with Che Guevara at its helm. It’s a movie that changed Otabek, the way he looks at life, the way he believes in things, but most importantly, it is also the movie that made him fall in love with motorbikes.

So of course, on one of the rarer chances of Yuri being the one to visit him in Almaty instead of him going to St. Petersburg, Otabek decides to sit him down through the whole movie. He’d wanted Yuri to watch and love the movie, too—or at the very least, understand why Otabek Altin is the way he is now, because the movie changed a large part of him.

He just never expected Yuri to actually love the movie so much he’d gotten the—well, not crazy, not really. It’s doable, a lot of people had done it, but it’s certainly not an idea that Otabek has ever entertained himself, because _between Almaty and St. Petersburg, there’s a whole 4,564 kilometers spread, separating them._

The idea begins with the end credits of the movie rolling down Otabek’s laptop screen, and Yuri, a blanket hanging off a shoulder, turns to him with sparkling eyes.

“Let’s go on a roadtrip,” he says, voice almost awed. “Let’s go back to St. Petersburg with your bike.”

Otabek stares, at a loss for a few moments, but from the get-go he knows it’s impossible to say no. Not when Yuri’s eyes shine in such excitement they nearly outblind his golden locks, not when his voice trembles in such anticipation, and Otabek finds himself subconsciously calculating the cost of fuel and food and inns in his head already.

He smiles, not quite in resignation. So maybe making Yuri sit down and watch _The Motorcycle Diaries_ is not a good idea—or is it?

Either way, an adventure clearly awaits.

**\-----o0o-----**

In the beginning, everyone thinks their friendship is an unlikely relationship.

Yuri Plisetsky is, after all, the one expected to continue Victor Nikiforov’s legacy on the ice when the world-renowned champion retires. Otabek Altin, on the other hand, is simply an existence seen as a dark horse in the competition. Yuri, the beautiful skater who charmed thousands through his skates, and Otabek, the mysterious skater whose thoughts and expressions unknown to all.

Even Otabek once thought a friendship with Yuri would be unlikely.

But it had been the fire in Yuri’s eyes that told him otherwise. That Yuri Plisetsky, like him, is a soldier, who moves only with sheer determination when faced with an unbreakable wall. That Yuri Plisetsky is more than the dances and the spins he presented to the world—that behind those flawless techniques, lies stubbornness and determination not unlike Otabek’s own. _We’re alike_ , Otabek had thought, and that was when the first thought of want flits in his mind: _I want to be his friend._

He didn’t expect Yuri to answer his wish with a bright smile.

In retrospect, he didn’t expect their friendship to be so… normal. Despite knowing that they’re alike, Otabek is aware that they’re also very different. Their personalities don’t really mix, and neither does their taste of music or fashion. Look, Otabek has his share of really odd friends—hell, most of his friends are downright weirdos—but he isn’t going to pretend that he understands Yuri’s obsession with animal prints.

And yet, they’d managed to figure out their dynamics in their newfound friendship rather seamlessly. Sometimes it’s nights of long phone calls where they share their training progress, frustrations over failed jumps, or even anxiety before a competition. Most nights it’s simply about enjoying each other’s presence over Skype calls, playing ridiculously stupid online games like agar.io or that one goat simulation games together. Sometimes it’s sending videos and photos of their trainings, Otabek’s DJ performance, or cats or even bears, but mostly it’s laidback messages of no importance tossed back and forth all day.

It is, almost surprisingly, too normal, if not for the fact that there’s a distance of 4,564 kilometers separating them most of the time.

But within that distance, Yuri grows increasingly important. More than just someone he admires, more than just the gorgeous incarnation of grace and beauty. He’s challenge, one that constantly reminds Otabek that he still has a long path to run, but he’s also a companion, one that never lets Otabek forget that he’s not running alone.

If that’s not a blessing to have, then Otabek doesn’t know what is.

**\-----o0o-----**

They pore over the Google Maps together for almost five hours, trying to decide which routes to go and where to stay and what to visit while they’re on the way. They both agree that they have to go through Astana—mostly because it’s the capital of Kazakhstan, and Yuri, despite having been visited Almaty several times to see Otabek, has never had the chance to actually explore the capital. Moscow also gets circled as one of the stops, because it’s the city Yuri grew up in and they have never roamed the streets of Moscow together. Yuri insists that they need to stop and explore Yekaterinburg once they are inside Russia’s borders, and perhaps Kirov, too, on the way there, because he thinks Otabek needs to see the Assumption Trivonov Monastery. Otabek doesn’t really mind—if Yuri thinks it’s something he’d like to show him, then he’d love to see it too.

He does, however, insisted that he’s going to take Yuri through Balkhash and visit the Balkhash Lake.

“Why?” Yuri asks, puzzled, because every webpage he glosses over that talks about Balkhash doesn’t really give him much information on what exactly is there to visit in that city. “Is the lake that beautiful?”

“Yeah,” Otabek nods. “But more importantly, I want to teach you something.”

Yuri’s eyebrows rise, high enough to disappear underneath his bangs. “Teach me what?”

A plush-doll of a Magikarp of considerable size is flung away from Otabek’s hand towards Yuri. Almost scrambling off the chair, Yuri reaches out and catches it by its tail before the silly Pokemon plush hits him straight in the face. Otabek smiles.

“Fishing.”

**\-----o0o-----**

At some point when he finally turns twenty, Otabek realizes with a sinking feeling in his stomach that he has, for a while, been in love.

He’s not sure when exactly his feelings in this friendship they’re both invested in changed. Or if it actually changed at all, because there’s always the possibility that he’d always been in love with Yuri, from the moment he first recognized the fire of a soldier burning behind Yuri’s eyes.

But the realization happens like this: at eight past two in the morning as he shoves his belongings into his bag in the dimly-lit changing room of a dance club he’d been performing as a DJ for the night, his phone blinks to life with a LINE message from Yuri. Nothing unusual—it should only be eleven o’clock-ish in St. Petersburg where Yuri lives, after all. He smiles, because it’s always nice to get messages from your friends, and opens it to see a picture of Yuri Plisetsky grinning from ear-to-ear, hugging a humongous, grumpy-looking teddy bear from behind.

 _Look what I found and bought today_ , the caption says. _This guy looks exactly like you!_

His heartbeat stumbles.

That’s not unusual, either. Otabek is used to having his heart skip a beat when it comes to Yuri Plisetsky. For years and years, even before he managed to gather his courage and asked Yuri to be his friend, Otabek has always been mesmerized by everything that makes up Yuri: the streak of gold that he paints across the ice as he dances, the gorgeous curve of his arms and legs as they arch, the flawless spirals and spins executed as if the air itself is what lifts Yuri’s body and sends it twirling. Yuri Plisetsky is almost other-worldly beautiful, even more so when one actually understands him and makes him smile, and Otabek is used to experiencing the heart-skipping moments where Yuri blinds him with his beauty.

It’s really not unlike the sense of watching a gold medal from afar: the moment when his heart skips a beat at its glint, both in anticipation and in awe of its beauty and what it symbolizes.

What is unusual is this: the subtlest clench of his heart, the sudden, almost unbearable sense of longing, the urge to perform a miracle of teleporting through his phone to where Yuri is and reaching out to _touch_. Otabek’s mind literally stops, halts like the world itself is suddenly paused, and realization comes crashing down.

 _Oh_ , Otabek Altin thinks, his thumb resting in over the curve of Yuri’s smile on the screen, _I’ve been in love for a long time._

**\-----o0o-----**

Yakov yells at Yuri for five minutes straight through the phone, because there’s less than a month left before Moscow’s GPF qualifier, in which Yuri is supposed to be participating. Taking an extra week to get back to St. Petersburg when he’s supposed to only be taking the weekend to visit Otabek over in Almaty just because motorbike roadtrip sounds like a great idea is apparently an absurd enough whim to warrant Yakov’s loud exasperation.

“You’re supposed to be here by tomorrow and get back to training!” Yakov’s roar sounds tinny through Yuri’s phone speaker, and in the background, there’s the familiar sound of Victor calling Yuuri Katsuki over, in his usual overly-cutesy voice reserved to flirt with the Japanese skater. Otabek watches Yuri roll his eyes, catches both amusement and fond annoyance in the way Yuri clicks his tongue, and smiles because he knows he’s one of the few people who actually understands how much Yuri actually loves the people around him. “I’m not making excuses for you to Lilia—!”

“I’ll call her myself,” Yuri counters, the note in his voice final. “I’ll practice twice harder to make up for being late, but for now I’m going on a roadtrip.”

“Motorbikes are dangerous—“ Yakov’s protests are then drowned by an overly-excited exclamation that could belong to none other than Victor: “Yurio! You’re going on a motorbike roadtrip?! That sounds so exciting!!”

After that, the conversation dissolves into yelling and shouting over the phone that basically boils down to Yuri protesting about how loud Victor is and how it isn’t something to get too excited on. Otabek allows himself a quiet laugh and a long, attentive gaze at the increasingly expressive and loose Yuri’s gestures and expressions are, because this? This is the side that no one outside of Yuri’s close circle is allowed to see.

The Yuri Plisetsky presented to the world is the incarnation of a goddess on ice: beautiful and unbelievably graceful, an art form carefully crafted in each and every curve of his limbs. A gorgeous force gliding over ice, but at the same time cold and distant like the star that he is. But the Yuri Plisetsky that stands beyond the Yuri Plisetsky presented to the world is made of fire and fierce emotions that constantly bubbles and bobs and is more alive than anything else Otabek has ever laid eyes upon.

He’s glad he’s one of the few people allowed to see this side of Yuri Plisetsky.

His own phone reverberates even as Yuri continues his loud exchange with Victor. Otabek glances at it reluctantly, eyebrows knitting when the name Yuuri Katsuki flashes on the screen. When he answers, though, it is Yakov’s voice that greets him, heavy and yet warm with acknowledgment: “Otabek Altin.”

Otabek’s back straightens automatically. “Yes.”

A heavy sigh from the other side. “There’s nothing I could do if he’s so stubborn about it,” and isn’t it funny, that Yakov sounds like he’s grumbling? Otabek thinks his life must be very exhausting. “I’ll entrust him to you. Please take care of him and get him back safely.”

“I will,” Otabek says evenly, because there’s no way he’d let himself do less than that. “I’ll be careful.”

“I heard that, Yakov!” Yuri hollers, throwing a glare at the phone in Otabek’s hand. “I’m eighteen, I can take care of myself!”

Another heavy sigh, which Otabek answers with an amused smile. “So he says.”

“So he says,” Yakov agrees. “Just get him back safe and sound, will you?”

Yuuri Katsuki ends the phone call with a warm greeting and an almost awkward-sounding “motorbike roadtrip sounds really tiring, so take care of each other, okay? Yurio would probably get mad if I ask you to take care of him, but you’re older and you’re—well, you’re the driver, so—“

“I’ll be careful,” he replies, and wonders if this is how it feels to have a whole family vets you when you’re trying to take their kid on a date. Not that the roadtrip is a date—wishful thinking would stay wishful thinking.

“Thank you,” Yuuri says cheerfully. “Say, what if we go and meet you guys in Moscow? Victor and I were planning to take a break by the end of this week, and I was thinking maybe we could get lunch together?”

The whole planning for this motorbike roadtrip is rather ridiculously impulsive. But then again, so has most of Otabek’s life been. What’s one more?

“Sure,” he agrees. “Yuri would appreciate that, I think.”

That he could say that without any hesitance is, Otabek believes, also a testament to how much he understands Yuri Plisetsky after these three years of friendship.

**\-----o0o-----**

The distance between Almaty and St. Petersburg spreads for 4,564 kilometers.

Closing their distance into zero and actually being in the same city as Yuri rarely happens. Sometimes Otabek thinks it’s a good motivation boost, too: if he could always get into finals, he’d get to see Yuri because Yuri would definitely make it into finals. Being together in the same city for at least a week, even if it’s only for competitions, is reward enough for all the qualifiers he had to pass through.

“You two are pretty close, huh?” Christophe Giacometti comments, his smile teasing, when he passes Otabek by the hotel lobby, voice nearly drowned by the shrieks of Yuri Angels gathering by the door. “Here to pick up the Russian Fairy again? The ladies out there must be jealous.”

 _I wish there’s actually a reason for them to be jealous_ , says the traitorous part in Otabek’s mind. He breathes out carefully, glances at the mob of girls waiting outside the door, and lets himself wonder for a moment if Yuri had actually ever thought about romantic relationships. Probably not—after all, he still gives Victor and Yuuri the disgusted look of a kid accidentally catching his parents making out when Victor so much as drape himself over Yuuri.

He doesn’t smile at Chris when he finally answers, “Dinner plans.”

Chris leaves with an airy laugh and what suspiciously sounds like, “young love,” which really only serves to make Otabek inwardly sigh and stares up at the ceiling.

Love.

What a complicated word.

“If you keep that frown, your face is going to be stuck like that.”

There’s a slender finger gently pressing in-between his eyebrows, tapping playfully. Otabek’s gaze refocuses, only to fall on Yuri whom he hasn’t seen in months—ever-slender, shoulders sharper, golden strands of his hair up in a tiny, high ponytail. For a heartbeat, Otabek burns Yuri’s figure beneath his eyelids, before finally lets a small smile curve over his lips and tells Yuri: “You’ve grown taller.”

The way Yuri lifts his shoulders in a shrug has always been so graceful. He takes the helmet Otabek offers in an unhurried sweep, long fingers curling over the headpiece like they’ve always belonged there. “I might just shoot past you in a few months,” he grins. “So, what do you feel like eating?”

 _You_ , Otabek’s mind supplies not-so-helpfully, and he says, “There’s an interesting Mexican restaurant around.”

Yuri’s smile streaks gold, like his hair, like his dance. “Sounds good!”

Otabek’s chest feels too warm.

**\-----o0o-----**

They leave Almaty with Otabek’s bike at five in the morning.

The cold still bites and the wind still stings as they speed down the road leading out of the city—Yuri’s arms secure around Otabek’s waist, earbuds shared in each one’s ear, blasting the playlist they had both created and put in Otabek’s phone the night before. The Zailiski Ala-Tau mountain system looms in the periphery of the city, its tops white against the pale blue of morning sky, and the surface of Alma Atinka river sparkle under the early sun.

“It’s gorgeous,” Yuri says, a sense of wonder underlining his voice, just as the haunting lilt of _On Love; Agape_ echoes in their ears. “It’s like those mountains are standing guard to your city because they’re in love with it.”

Otabek hums. “I’m glad you like it.”

Yuri’s laughter tinkles like summer chimes, as his arms tighten just so around Otabek’s waist. “Like it?” he repeats, sounding amused. “Beka, I might not be Kazakh, but I love this city already.”

A part of him that stays a determined dreamer, the part that is most familiar with wishful thoughts, hears _I love this city because it’s where you are_ , but Otabek focuses his eyes on the road instead and silences the thought.

Wishful thinking should stay wishful thinking.

**\-----o0o-----**

Ever since he was a child, Otabek dreams of gold often.

It used to be the vast yellow-brown steppes dyed in the golden sunrays, mere minutes before the sun returns to the arms of the horizon. Or the prairies, with its endless spread of grasslands and the sun overhead, baking it into beautiful gold. It’s the sound of the wind and images of wolves, of boundless savannah blending into the horizon, and men of olds told in stories exchanged in front of fires. Sometimes it’s the peak of towers in Almaty, windows gleaming gold against a backdrop of blue sky, and its city bustling underneath. The voice of his grandmother, whispering tales of Kazakhstan past, and Otabek dreams of heroes decked in gold.

Once he’s known the wonder of gliding over the ice, he dreams of golden spotlight instead. Of gold medals swaying in the distance, and the ice, white and cold and unforgiving, unsteady under his feet. Of glints reflected on the medal bouncing on Victor Nikiforov’s chest, an image as majestic as the World Champion’s bewitching performances. A dream held close even when he’s awake, a dream that he could run after, for once, and try to grasp. He dreams of the weight of his first gold medal in his hand, too, and how it shines under the flashes of cameras.

Now, he dreams of streaks of gold across the ice, painted by the arch of slender limbs and long fingers. He dreams of swipes of gold in perfect spirals, an embodiment of fiery determination and stubbornness, and Yuri Plisetsky’s eyes and smiles, framed by golden strands that sway side-to-side as he laughs.

**\-----o0o-----**

Five hours and a half an hour of break into their roadtrip, Yuri blurts out: “I’m hungry.”

“We have chips in the bag,” Otabek says, slowing down so Yuri could let go of his waist and twist around to get their supplies bag. “Second zipper.”

“Got it,” Yuri’s reply, when it comes, sounds muffled. A glance at the rearview mirror shows him twisting around again to return the bag to its original position, a bag of chip clutched in-between his teeth. “You want some?”

“I can’t really eat while I’m driving, can I?”

“’Course you can,” Yuri huffs, and there’s the distinct sound of the bag of chips being teared open. The next thing he realized, Yuri’s left hand snakes back around his waist, except this time with an open bag of chips. Otabek stares, uncomprehending, until Yuri’s other hand snakes around his other side, dips into the bag, brings out a chip and holds it up in front of his mouth. “Open your mouth.”

“Are you feeding me,” Otabek says, and he’s pretty sure something in his chest had just exploded over how adorable Yuri is.

“Well, I don’t want to eat by myself,” Yuri’s finger moves, tapping the chip against Otabek’s lips. “What, embarrassed to be feed?”

Otabek sends a silent prayer to whatever deity is listening. If this is how their roadtrip is going to go, he’s not sure his heart would survive all the way to St. Petersburg.

**\-----o0o-----**

He tells Zaure about it.

She is, after all, one of the very few friends he has, and the only other one who is also a figure skating athlete (not counting Yuri because Otabek is suddenly no long sure of how exactly he should count Yuri as). She responds by pausing in the middle of tying the laces of her skating shoes, stares him down blankly like she isn’t quite sure if he has really just spoken, and says evenly, “sorry, сүйіктім, you’re going to have to repeat that because I’m not sure I heard you right the first time.”

Otabek stares at her right back, unfazed by her reaction, and repeats, “I’m pretty sure I am in love with Yuri Plisetsky.”

Zaure opens her mouth, closes it, and opens it again. “Huh,” she replies, nodding vaguely. Her fingers jerk and pull on the laces, clearly more forceful than intended because she winces a little. “Yuri Plisetsky.”

Otabek nods. Doesn’t answer. Zaure finishes tying up her skating shoes in the short silence that falls between them, before her voice comes back, hovering in the edge of hesitance and non-chalance. “Isn’t he like, thirteen?”

He levels her a frown. “Sixteen.”

Zaure waves a hand. “Same difference, not old enough to actually drink.”

Otabek doesn’t even blink. “Most Russians start drinking before they’re even thirteen.”

“So you’re looking for justification, сүйіктім?” the sigh that escapes Zaure’s lips doesn’t echo in the empty ice rink, but it reverberates endlessly in Otabek’s ears. “I have nothing to say that you haven’t thought yourself. Mostly because he’s—well, I mean, you’re young too, but he’s still really young.”

 _We both are,_ Otabek wants to counter, but he knows it’s not the same, so he bites his tongue. By his side, Zaure straightens up and clears her throat.

“It’s not about right or wrong,” she tells him quietly. “He’ll be an adult too, in no time. Maybe then, the two of you together could be an idea. But he’s still really young now, сүйіктім, and from what I’ve seen, he’s a lot like you.”

The corner of Otabek’s lips twitch upwards. “You could tell.”

That earns him a light slap. “How long do you think I’ve known you,” Zaure snorts. “Stubborn. Determined, if not ambitious. Driven. Most importantly, a fighter.”

“A tiger,” Otabek finishes, and Zaure smiles.

“And you’re our wolf,” she says. “But my point is, сүйіктім, he’s young, and he’s a lot like you, so he probably has never even thought about being in romantic relationship. Hell, he probably hasn’t ever thought about falling in love.”

He lets that sink in. Lets his mind ponder that, lets himself remember how Yuri turns a shade of awkward red in the face of Victor and Yuuri holding hands in public. Lets himself remember the spark in Yuri’s eyes at the word ‘friends’ that Otabek had offered a few years ago. Lets himself remember Yuri’s figure, gliding over the ice with the haunting melodies of Agape echoing behind each of his steps and move.

 _Yuri knows love,_ he thinks. But not the kind that clenches at Otabek’s heart, probably because Yuri has never experienced it himself.

And if Otabek thinks that he gets to teach Yuri about that sort of love just because he wishes to, then he’s nothing but a mere arrogant man.

**\-----o0o-----**

There are, however, a few things that Otabek is sure he could teach Yuri.

“You were serious,” Yuri states, jaw slack with surprise when Otabek returns to where he’d left Yuri and his bike on one of the piers of Lake Balkhash earlier with two fishing rods and a box of baits. The lake, fifteenth largest lake in the world, is a gorgeous body of blue sparsed with green—mostly willow trees and riparian forests—reflecting perfect white fluff of clouds hanging on the sky that is the same exact shade of blue as the water. Far across, they could see the vague shapes of Balkhash’s Mining and Metallurgical Plant.

“I never said I wasn’t serious,” Otabek says, and Yuri accepts one of the fishing rods with a dumbfounded look. “Let’s find a good spot.”

He teaches Yuri how to attach baits and how to aim the rod. It’s a slow process—almost too methodical and boring, and when Yuri finally manages to flung his rod with a huge grin and settles down, that grin is completely wiped out once Otabek tells him, “and now we wait.”

Yuri groans. “Fuck, I forgot about this part of fishing.”

“It’s part of why it’s fun,” Otabek smiles as Yuri drops right next to him. Far on the water, a fishing ship or two pass, hearty shouts and laughter exchanged among fishermen. “I used to fish here when I was a kid. My relative used to have a cabin close by the lake—they live in the Balkhash City now, but we could go and borrow their grill.”

“Fresh fish for dinner,” Yuri wrinkles his nose. “Sounds like something the Katsudon would eat.”

“It’s going to be really delicious. My family has a secret recipe.”

They talk—like always, of nothing and everything at the same time. Nineteen hours away from Almaty, parts of childhood Otabek has never really considered to tell anyone because they’re simply mundane memories, but Yuri listens in rapt attention like he’s never heard anything more interesting. Otabek wonders what it is that Yuri finds interesting in the story of how Otabek once accidentally caught a giant Balkhash minnow, or how that one time his uncle had run home out of breath because he stumbled upon the endangered Dalmatian pelican. He’s never been a good storyteller, after all.

“Your family is huge,” Yuri comments, and there are sparks of excited gold in his eyes. “What’s it like, Beka?”

And that is when Otabek realizes that to Yuri, his memories _are_ interesting, exactly because they’re _his_.

Because they’re _Otabek’s_ memories, and Yuri wishes to learn them. Because they’re friends, Otabek reminds himself, but a part of him mulls it over further: _can’t we be more?_

**\-----o0o-----**

They catch three carps and a humongous Balkhash perch.

Yuri’s laughter echoes in the breeze that sweeps over open water as he struggles to reel in the perch. Otabek abandons his own fishing rod to help, and the two ends up stumbling over one another after a particular strong pull they did to bring the perch onto the shore. Yuri’s elbow digs onto Otabek’s side, and Otabek’s own elbow grinds into the hard ground, but Yuri’s shoulders shake with peals of laughter so free Otabek forgets how to breathe for a moment.

A golden eagle swoops low; its talons hovering just inches over the surface of the water, passing them as they pick up the still-flopping perch. Yuri freezes, eyes wide and mouth open in awe, and Otabek watches the eagle snatch its prey out of the water, violently wrenching it out before leaping back up and high towards the sky, disappearing into the shades of riparian forests, leaving mere ripples on the surface of the lake.

They stay to watch the first shadow of night falls over the open water—shoulders pressed together, silent as they lean onto Otabek’s motorbike, helmets in hands. It’s a short trip to Otabek’s relative’s house afterwards, where the family not only let them borrow the grill, but also decided to throw them a barbecue feast. Yuri, awkward as ever when faced with sincere pleasure and welcome, ducks his face into Otabek’s arm after one of Otabek’s cousins compliments his latest short program performed at the Worlds, before muttering a gruff thanks, and looks baffled when that earns him an amused laugh from his best friend.

The grilled carps and perch are extremely delicious. The cool night of Balkhash is comfortable, too. But most importantly, Yuri’s small smiles, hidden in the warmth of the open fire, are beautiful.

Perhaps he’s too entranced by those smiles, that Otabek doesn’t even notice his hand reaching out, fingers flitting across Yuri’s jaw, until Yuri turns to him with a smile and a questioning lilt around his name: “Beka?”

Otabek’s eyes soften.

The tip of his thumb passes over the corner of Yuri’s lips, smudging the trace of barbecue sauce there along the line of Yuri’s lower lip. He lets go, brings his thumb into his own mouth, and sucks lightly.

“Told you it’s going to be delicious,” he says, and because he doesn’t have the courage to look at Yuri, he turns back to the grill instead.

He misses the shade of red on Yuri’s cheeks, turning darker.

**\-----o0o-----**

In the span of months between his realization of actually being in love with Yuri Plisetsky and his first GPF qualifier of the year, Otabek hits a rut.

It’s extremely frustrating, because no matter what he tries, he ends up screwing things up. Axels and lutzes, salchow and spiral spins—even his acting only gets him a displeased, pointed look from his coach. All his triple loops somehow turn into single, and this continues on for two weeks straight, until Otabek has to end each training session gritting his teeth in shame at the clear frown his coach is permanently sporting now.

But the most frustrating thing is that he doesn’t even know why he can’t seem to concentrate.

“You’re not even concentrating!” Zaure barks at him, the evening she comes by to watch him train, glaring as Otabek fails his salchow for the fourth time. The heel of her skating shoes tap against the surface of the ice, over and over, impatient. “If this keeps going, you’re not going to be able to qualify for the GPF at all!”

He grits his teeth as he pulls himself up, the ice biting cold into his palm. Zaure’s feet sweeps into his line of sight, stopping right before him, but he doesn’t look up. He stares at the scratched surface of the ice instead, watches the white flakes cling to the blades under his shoes.

Zaure clicks her tongue at him, before she drops into a crouch, eyes seeking his own. “Cүйіктім,” she says, but Otabek avoids her eyes until she raises a hand to his cheek, keeping his head in place and forcing him to look at her. “What’s on your mind?”

His jaws work, silently, as if they’re looking for excuses, but what comes out is this: “I don’t know.”

Nothing is going right. He goes home disappointed at himself, at Zaure, at his coach, at everything in his way. He catches himself thinking about Yuri, and it makes him even more frustrated for reasons he doesn’t even know. He goes online, sees interviews of J.J. and Seung-Gil, sees a few more of Yuuri Katsuki and Victor, and a bunch of Yuri as well, and all he could think of is _why can’t I--?_

“Take a day off,” his coach tells him the next day. “Go and do your thing—I don’t know, go perform your DJ shows, or gallivanting with your bike, or hang out with your weird friends. Maybe you’re too stressed.”

He wishes it were that simple.

He takes the day off, nonetheless. Goes on Skype, turns it into invisible mode, stays in bed for a whole day with _The Motorcycle Diaries_ playing on his TV—its dialogues and scenes a white noise to his frustrated mind. He ignores his phone, even when it rings insistently around four in the afternoon, Yuri’s name flashing on the screen. Notifications of messages blink at him, one after another: _Beka, are you up for Skyping tonight?_ , and _why aren’t you reading your LINE messages,_ and _Beka are you okay?,_ and _are you sick,_ and _I’m going to call you_ , and then the frantic-sounding _why aren’t you answering your phone, are you okay?_

And lastly, the lone message that finally arrives on the Skype chatroom, well into the night: _are you mad at me?_

Minutes, hours. Midnight rolls around and then past, and the last message, quiet and sad, sitting on the chatroom, makes something in Otabek’s heart constricts.

His stubbornness breaks.

He fumbles with his phone, heart pounding, fingers shaking. The monotone dial tone continues to what feels like an eternity, until finally, finally—a click resounds, and it’s Yuri’s familiar, though hurried, voice answers, “Beka?!”

He opens his mouth, finds nothing to say, and grunts instead.

Yuri is silent for a few moments. “Beka,” his voice, careful and somewhat hesitant, and oh-so young that it hurts. Otabek closes his eyes. “Are you mad?”

“No.”

“Oh,” the relief in Yuri’s voice is palpable. “Okay. Were you really busy today? Did you get a sudden DJ performance request or something?”

“No.”

“Accidentally fell asleep early? Or were you busy watching that favorite movie of yours again?”

“No—“ the word breaks, and Otabek almost chokes on it. “Yuri—“

A pause. Then a concerned noise.

“Beka…?”

He doesn’t answer. Simply breathes into the phone, slowly, and for the first time since he understands what the pain in his chest means when he thinks of Yuri, whole-heartedly accepts everything. The bone-tired exhaustion that’s been dogging his steps, messing up his efforts. The way his throat seizes and his chest constricts when he so much as hears Yuri’s voice. The frustration of still not being good enough for the gold, even though he wants it—wants them—so badly: the sweet taste of victory, the gold medal, the laughter that clings to the corner of Yuri’s lips, framed by golden strands.

 _I miss you_ , he wants to say. So much that it hurts. But he remembers how young Yuri is, how he wishes to see Yuri learn and discover, and so he swallows the words back down.

He doesn’t cry. Doesn’t say anything. Yuri doesn’t, either.

For once, Yuri simply stops and listens.

**\-----o0o-----**

They stop briefly at Karaganda, because a twenty-five hour motorbike trip to the capital of Kazakhstan, Astana, without an overnight rest is basically suicidal.

Overnight rest, he tells Yuri, is basically resupplying everything. Fuel and water and food—the essentials, of course, but most importantly, energy. They both need a good, whole night sleep after being on the road on a motorbike for countless hours with only brief respites. Besides, the puppet show at Theatre Buratino in Karaganda has some of the best actors in Kazakhstan, and as figure skaters, they could always learn more from actual actors.

“We should explore the city next time,” Yuri tells him the next morning, as he offers the right half of his earphone to Otabek before accepting his helmet. Otabek lets his bike give a loud roar once, making sure everything is settled, then gestures to Yuri to get on the back. “This seems like a really interesting place to explore.”

“Russians used to joke that Karaganda is in the middle of nowhere,” Otabek informs him, and chuckles when Yuri makes a disbelieving noise. “To be fair, it really sort of is in the middle of nowhere.”

“Doesn’t mean it’s not interesting.” In their ears, the first song begins—an unexpected personal favorite of Otabek’s, one of the first Kazakh songs he’d shared with Yuri. Yuri presses closer, his grin reflected in the rearview mirror. “This is the song that made them dub you the Hero of Kazakhstan, isn’t it?”

“They were exaggerating,” Otabek answers, and in his ear, voices of members of KeshYou trickle, strong and clear despite the constant roar of his bike: _I’m glad with the male wolves of my boundless steppes, I’m glad, I’m glad—_ “It’s just because this was the song I performed to when I got into Worlds the first time.”

Yuri hums. “You said you liked this song because it reminds you of the gold.”

Of boundless steppes. Of the gold medal. Of the gorgeous gold Yuri paints as he dances on ice. But mostly of determination needed to reach for all that gold for himself. The song in his ear goes: _he never depends on anyone, his heart is free, in harmony with rumbles—_

“Don’t tell anyone,” he reminds Yuri, and the laugh he gets is gold, too.

“It’s okay, Beka,” a light slap on his shoulder, before Yuri’s arm snakes back around his waist, warm and secure. “I won’t tell anyone that your favorite song is a girlband song.”

**\-----o0o-----**

Someone in one of the many webpages Yuri had browsed through wrote that Astana is the strangest capital in the world.

Otabek thinks it’s probably true. He was certainly not yet born when Astana was declared the new capital of Kazakhstan, replacing Almaty, but he thinks if he had been, he would have been completely uninterested in moving out to Astana. It’s all futuristic skyscrapers, metal and glass, and temperatures could drop below thirty degrees Celsius in winter. It’s gorgeous, yes, and the city offers a lot for non-locals to explore, but Otabek vastly prefers his own hometown.

At least Astana leaves Yuri wide-eyed and amazed as they go through the main thoroughfare of the city. There’s the giant transparent tent that is the Khan Shatyr Entertainment Center, known as the highest tensile structure in the world. Or the Pyramid of Peace and Reconciliation, made out of five “stories” of triangles clad in pale granites and stained glass. Then there’s the _Bäyterek_ monument, the most famous landmark in Astana—a towering structure topped by a nest of white metal and a giant golden orb, embodying the mythical tree of life and Samruk, the magical bird who left an egg in the crevice between two branches of a poplar tree.

“Am I in a sci-fi movie or something?” Yuri whispers, and Otabek chuckles in amusement before dragging him off to eat besbermak at the restaurant close by the Hazrat Sultan mosque.

They stay the night in Astana, after closing the day with a visit to the National Museum of Kazakhstan, where Otabek walks Yuri through the history of Kazakhstan in a more personal way—coupling family stories handed down through generations in his family with the exhibitions shown in the museum. Stories of famine, conquest, labors, but also of folklores and men on horses, wolves and nomadic tribes, and even, at one point, tips on how to skin lambs.

He wakes up the next morning to the pale rays of dawn that illuminate golden hair, to Yuri’s slender figure standing by the window, drawing the blinds, watching the city rouses from sleep with pensive eyes.

“Yuri?” he calls, and the eyes that turn to him are far away—the eyes of a dancer lost deep in his own performance, a philosopher in his own thoughts, an actor in his own play. The voice that answers isn’t louder than the air, hanging still, wisps of breath slipping out of thin lips.

“We’re all,” the words dissipate as soon as they touch air. “Really small, aren’t we.”

Otabek recognizes this. After all, once, the first time he finished watching _The Motorcycle Diaries,_ he had reacted the same way.

There’s change happening, dawning, somewhere inside Yuri.

Otabek could only wonder what it was that Yuri had learnt in this trip for that change to occur.

**\-----o0o-----**

Most of the times, the distance between them measures to 4,564 kilometers long.

“Wouldn’t it be nice,” Yuri complains, after a bout of yelling at Victor and Yuuri, who had barged inside his room without knocking while he’s on Skype with Otabek playing agar.io. Thanks to the idiot couple, he’d died. “If we could hang out together after practice.”

Their gazes meet through the screen. Otabek says, slowly, “we do hang out after practice. We _are_ hanging out after practice, right now.”

“You know what I mean,” Yuri groans, stabbing the take-out container Yuuri had brought as an offering earlier. The pasta in the restaurant the idiot couple had had dinner in is famously good, and he’s not about to waste really good food. “I mean, I like hanging out with you like this, too. But sometimes, you know, it’d be nice to plan to go to the movies after practice, or maybe go out for a drink together—oh fuck, did I just die?”

The fish on his screen blinks rapidly before it scatters into pixels. “You died,” Otabek informs him, eyes dancing in amusement. “Also, you’re still fifteen.”

“I’m Russian,” Yuri points out, half-heartedly bringing a forkful of pasta into his mouth. Otabek salutes him, the corners of his lips twitching up, clearly laughing at him. “And that’s not my point.”

For a long moment, there’s only the background sound noises of the game filling in the room. Yuri tries to concentrate on eating his pasta as fast as possible so he wouldn’t die in the game, again. He ends up neglecting his dinner to concentrate, and manages to beat Otabek this time with a victorious snicker at the low-sounding curse escaping Otabek’s lips.

It’s only when Otabek finally bids him goodbye that he pauses, stares closely at Yuri, and agrees, “It’d be really nice.”

Yuri’s eyes brighten.

**\-----o0o-----**

The borders of between Kazakhstan and Russia fly by with no complications. The fact that some of the border guards had recognized them as the Yuri Plisetsky and Otabek Altin probably helps a little bit.

Yekaterinburg is their next big stop. Mostly they both explored the historical churches and museums (fine arts, military, Ascension Church—really, you name it) for a whole two days, then goes up the Vysotsky Viewing Platform for a gorgeous view of Russia’s urban panorama. They spent quite a lot of money at the chain restaurant Stolle, which specializes on sweet and savory pirozhki, where Yuri engages in an hour long conversation about pirozhki recipes with one of the bakers and Otabek falls in love with the restaurant’s salmon pirozhki.

“I could make it for you,” Yuri tells him. “I could probably make it better than I did the katsudon pirozhki.”

“I like your katsudon pirozhki,” Otabek answers, and the sparkle in Yuri’s eyes almost blinds him. It’s worth it, though, because the wide smile etched over Yuri’s lips is brighter than that.

About fifteen hours from Yekaterinburg, three days later, they stop at Kirov for an overnight stay. It’s a city located in the area of taiga forests of Russia, famous for clay statues and whistles, and in later years up until now, a major transport hub. Yuri takes him to see the Assumption Trivonov Monastery—or its Cathedral, really. Majestic dome-like roofs arching over white walls, towering in the center of the monastery; the Cathedral is at once a functioning monastery and a monument of Soviet times. They circle the city several times, makes the time to drop by and see Alexandrovsky Garden, before finally retiring for the night.

“Moscow tomorrow,” Yuri says, and then pretend-groans. “I guess we’re going to have to go and catch up with Victor and Katsudon for lunch.”

Otabek glances at him with a small smile. “You’re happy.”

“I’m excited to see Grandpa,” Yuri corrects him, throws a pillow playfully at his best friend, only for it to be caught one-handed. “I know you’ve gone and explored Moscow before, so I’m just planning to take you around places I liked when I was a kid. Is that okay?”

Otabek wants to tell him that yes, it’s okay. That yes, he wants nothing more than to trace the footsteps of Yuri’s life when he grew up in Moscow, that he wants to learn how Yuri becomes someone with the eyes of a fighter—someone who charms the whole world and enchants Otabek’s heart completely.

He throws the pillow back, manages to hit Yuri on the shoulder despite the younger blonde ducking away, and chuckles at the playful glare he receives. “Moscow,” he repeats, smiling. “I’m really looking forward to it.”

Yuri beams.

**\-----o0o-----**

“Happy Birthday!” Yuri says cheerfully, flashing a plane ticket in front of his web camera. “I’m going to visit you in Almaty this time!”

4,564 kilometers long. A distance easily crossed with a plane, or even trains. Even more easily bridged by internet calls and messages.

And yet, the plane ticket is possibly the best birthday present Otabek has ever received, even if he’s not the one who will be using it.

**\-----o0o-----**

Moscow is freezing.

Yuri’s grandfather welcomes them with a blazing fire in the hearth, ushering them in for hot drinks after making sure that Otabek parked his bike safely. The surprise lies in the fact that Victor and Yuuri have been waiting there, in Yuri’s grandfather’s dining room, munching on katsudon pirozhki and watching old soap operas, utterly sending Yuri into berserk mode because “What the hell are you two doing here?!”

“How cold, Yurio!” Victor exclaims. “We’re here to visit you, of course! It’s been almost a month since we saw you left for Almaty, and you didn’t even call once!”

“First of all, why do I have to call you--!” Yuri rages, while Yuuri Katsuki rises to his feet to wave at Otabek with a warm, “Hi, Otabek!”

“Yuuri Katsuki,” Otabek nods, and Yuri elbows him lightly on the side. “Don’t get roped into his pace, Beka!”

“Eeehh,” Yuuri says, his expression a hilarious pretend-sad, close enough to mirror Victor’s puppy eyes.  “Yurio, so mean.”

“And don’t call me that!!”

Yuri’s grandfather serves them both some of the katsudon pirozhki, apparently having made it at Victor’s request when he and Yuuri arrived earlier that morning. Lunch basically spoiled, the four of them end up talking amicably over each of their preparations for their respective GPF qualifier. This year would really be Victor’s last, apparently, and Otabek wonders how it would feel, to know that this GPF season would be your last.

Judging by how Victor still talks excitedly about his plans for Yuuri’s programs, he doesn’t seem to mind very much.

“They’re gross, aren’t they,” Yuri makes a face when he takes Otabek to his old room after Victor and Yuuri took their leave. There are kids’ toys heaped on one corner of the room still, and a crevice between the closet and the desk that would fit to be a hiding place for a kid. These too, Otabek thinks, are the scattered hints of Yuri’s childhood. “Always so all over one another, hugging or holding hands in front of people, ugh. Grossly in love.”

Otabek smiles. “It’s a good thing, isn’t it?”

“It’s not something I understand,” Yuri answers as he pulls the closet open, trying to drag the extra pillows in there out. Something in Otabek’s stomach lurches down with the inevitability of _ah, as I thought._ “I mean, if being in love is supposed to make you that happy, why does it hurt you as well? Like it did Georgi.”

Otabek resists the urge to place a hand over his own heart. It’s not going to soothe the pain, anyway. “Have you ever fallen in love, Yuri?”

The curve of Yuri’s shoulders falls. His chin ducks into the giant tiger-printed pillow in his arms, almost as if he’s trying to fold into himself, and there’s something in his eyes that Otabek can’t quite place.

“I’m not sure,” the answer hangs thin in the old room, as if the words are weightless, lighter than dust. “If I had—if I had understood better, maybe I could have performed Agape better.”

Leftover regrets, laced with determination to improve. Otabek is familiar with that too. What’s unfamiliar is the way Yuri’s eyes turn sharp when they find his—looking, searching—and the question comes: “Have you, Beka?”

 _I am in love,_ Otabek thinks.

He turns away to look out the windows instead.

**\-----o0o-----**

Yuri takes him to walk around Moscow the next morning.

They’re both bundled up in the warmest jacket and scarves, despite winter is yet to roll around. Yuri brings a bag of katsudon pirozhki with him, and they walk all the way to the old bridge overviewing the river to the stream of childhood memories recounted. Stories of Yuri’s grandfather, of Yuri’s mother and the random movies she played in, or how she’d retired early and left him be the sole source of income in their family. Otabek listens, attentive, etching every word and emotions that Yuri spins tales of, because these are what made Yuri to have the eyes of a soldier.

They pause over an open pier by the river, and Yuri stops telling his stories for a few moments, before deciding to completely change the topic: “My theme for GPF this year is _loving the world_.”

Otabek tilts his head. “Loving the world?”

“I wasn’t satisfied with Agape,” Yuri says, and before Otabek could open his mouth to counter that, he rushes to continue. “I did my best for that, and I’m glad over how it turned out. But that’s not—Beka, I didn’t understand it completely.” He pauses, kicks the stray pebble by his foot and watches it jump into the water. “Not Agape, and not even love.”

Otabek closes his mouth. “Yuri…”

“I didn’t understand a lot of things,” Yuri says, voice soft. “That’s why, I thought a roadtrip is a good idea. I want to understand. I can’t perform something I don’t understand, can I?”

He isn’t sure he could answer that. Not with how Yuri suddenly feels so far away, so impossible to understand. “What don’t you understand?”

“Love,” Yuri says. “What it means to love—be it things, memories, or people. Aren’t these what this world is made out of? How do I fall in love with them, and understand how to love the world?”

Yuri’s eyes, as clear as the shade of the water, are bright.

“Beka,” he says, and he sounds awed. “I think I have been falling in love.”

And suddenly, Otabek understands. Yuri has been falling in love, has been learning and discovering about falling in love, in the span of 4,564 kilometers that they went through from Almaty to St. Petersburg. It’s in the wide-eyed wonder when he stared at the mountains lining the horizon of Almaty, it’s in the breathless amazement as they watched the golden eagle swoops low to snatch his prey out of the water, and the rapt attention on stories of old. It’s in the cheerful hum of Kesh You songs under his breath, and in the realization of how small everyone is, compared to the whole world, dawned just as the sun rises over Astana’s sky.

“You’ve fallen in love,” the words leave his tongue before he even realizes it. “With the world. And—“ he pauses, breath almost stuttering when he catches Yuri’s cheeks turning red. “And—with me….?”

Somewhere down the river, something makes a loud splash.

Yuri bites his lips. “I don’t know about that,” he admits. “I told you yesterday. I don’t understand it—the love that Yuuri feels for Victor, or vice-versa. It took almost all of me to even begin to understand what Agape was, did you know?”

Otabek stays silent. Yuri takes a deep breath, letting it out in a slow sigh, and Otabek watches the white puffs escaping his mouth.

“What I understand,” Yuri continues. “Is that you’re special. You’re my best friend. I love being with you. You taught me to slow down, to pause and take my time, even when I get really stubborn. To be patient and to cherish the time I have. I’ve always rushed myself, even when I was just a kid, and there you were, trying to teach me to fish.” A small, genuinely amused smile curve over Yuri’s lips. “And I think that’s why I was able to fall in love.”

The grin that stretches on Yuri’s face outblinds the sparkle of the surface of the water. “Thank you, Beka.”

Otabek stares at him. “But that’s absurd,” he says. “You were the one who taught me things. Way back then, that it’s okay to stay as myself and choose my own path, and be stubborn in it. Then you taught me that it’s easier to break through walls when I’m not alone.”

Yuri blinks at him twice, confused. “But that’s common sense.”

“You taught me that,” Otabek says. “You showed me, even. That with someone else on my back, I could simultaneously eat chips and drive at the same time.”

The peal of laughter that breaks the tranquility of the river surprises Otabek. Yuri clasps a hand on his mouth, hilarity in his eyes. “Good to know that I taught you important things?”

Otabek sighs. “You know what I mean,” he counters, lips twitching up. Yuri’s grin is wide and free when he drops his hand, amused and happy, and Otabek thinks it’s the most beautiful he has ever seen.

Before them, the river flows with not a care in the world.

“I don’t think I understand it yet,” it’s Yuri’s voice that finally breaks the silence between them. “And I don’t know if I want to call this love, yet. But I do know that you’re precious, and I do love you, even if I still don’t understand.”

Otabek wonders how it’s possible for his chest to simultaneously feel warm and full and hurt at the same time. He breathes through it carefully, settles into a small smile, and says, “That’s okay, we have time. I’ll wait.”

Yuri’s foot bumps against his own. When he speaks, his voice is quietly sincere.

“Do you love me, Beka?”

That’s an easy one Otabek could answer.

“I do love you, Yuri.”

**\-----o0o-----**

St. Petersburg is bright with night lights, when Otabek’s bike finally enters.

Familiar crossroads and corners, bustling night clubs and bars. A place that has grown dear to his heart, 4,564 kilometers away from home. A place that once holds possibilities and dreams, but now a place where his heart resides.

The lights on Victor and Yuuri’s room is on, when they finally stop in front of the building the Russian skaters training under Yakov share. Yuri looks up, letting Otabek take away his helmet, and comments, “they’re home already.”

“They did take the train,” Otabek says. He reaches out, fingers skittering over a few golden strands hovering over Yuri’s shoulder, gently taking away the left side of their shared earphones. The beginning of Yuri’s new short program music trickles into the frozen St. Petersburg air, and Otabek wonders what shade of gold would Yuri paint in his GPF qualifier in Moscow two weeks from now on.

His fingers close around Yuri’s arm. “Your first GPF qualifier is in Moscow, right?”

Yuri meets his eyes, absently shouldering his backpack. “Yeah?”

“I’ll come watch,” Otabek says, and he’s amazed at himself for getting the words out calmly. “If you don’t mind. I want to see what you’ve learned, what you’ve discovered, and—and how you’d transform on ice.”

Yuri’s hand rests over his wrist, holding gently, and the eyes that meet Otabek’s own is positively shining.

“Come,” it sounds like an order. One that a hero must abide to. Yuri Plisetsky looks up at him, confident and yet excited. “I’ll make sure to show you what I’ve understood then.”

**\-----o0ogf-----**

The gold medal is heavy around his neck.

The spotlight on the podium is hot—which is odd, because they’re not even ten meters away from the ice rink, and it’s Moscow. Yuri wonders if it’s because he’s completely exhausted after completely letting go of himself in his last performance, or if he’s just utterly, unbearably nervous.

Yuuri and Victor are there, close by, when he descends from the podium. “Yurio!” Victor claims, arms quick around his shoulders, before stepping away to let Yuuri congratulate the youngest skater among them. Yuri can’t even find it in himself to be irritated at the two, because there’s a flower crown in Yuuri’s hand: whites and blues, winding around one another, easily recognizable as he had been the one who chose them for Yuuri and Victor’s wedding.

“You brought them?” he blurts out, voice more nervous than he’d felt this morning. “You got the right flowers?”

Yuuri laughs. It’s warm and fond, and Yuri watches Victor’s eyes soften at the sound. “Just as you asked. Congratulations, Yurio!”

“And good luck,” Victor says, lightly patting him on the back.

“Thanks,” Yuri answers, because he’s going to need that. His fingers curl around the flower crown carefully, keeping each petal smooth as he turns around, eyes sweeping over the spectator seats, looking for the familiar figure—there.

Otabek. Standing by the corner close to the kiss and cry, with a small proud smile on his lips. Yuri closes his eyes, shoulder shaking in what feels like half-laughter and half-tears, and then his legs propel him forward, sending him running to where Otabek is.

“Beka—“ the name slips out of his mouth without so much as a conscience. “I—“

Otabek beats him to it, by reaching out to pull the gold medal away from Yuri’s chest, and plants a firm kiss upon it.

Yuri’s breath catches in his throat, and his face heats.

He’s performed his best—he’s performed everything he’d learned, everything he’d understood. The short program that had brought him this gold medal had been an embodiment of what he is, of what he feels. He’d thrown everything he knows about loving the world: the realization of how he’s just a tiny speck in this whole world, of how much people love the places they belong to and how much they love the places that hold their hearts. But most importantly, he’d learned about falling in love with the world, with the distance of 4,564 kilometers and everything that spread in-between, and above all, with Otabek Altin.

Did his feelings reach Otabek, he wonders.

He doesn’t wait and ask, though. Instead, he lets his hand reaches up to place the flower crown on top of Otabek’s head. Whites and blues of forget-me-nots and bluebells, perching snugly over Otabek’s head, among strands of black hair.

Otabek blinks, lips still against Yuri’s medal, eyes confused.

“Yuri?”

“This is what I have understood,” Yuri says. His heart feels like it’s going to explode. “My feelings, these flowers—they were what I chose to define Yuuri’s feelings for Victor.” 

True love and gratitude, above everything. Yuri drops his hand, rests them over Otabek’s own, fingers clutching tight, and his throat nearly closes up. But Otabek’s eyes are wide, hesitance and disbelief marring the happiness reflected in there, and Yuri finds his courage.

 _You taught me that it’s easier to break through walls when I’m not alone_ , Yuri remembers. _You taught me to slow down, to be patient, and to cherish the time I have_ , he thinks.

The distance between him and Otabek now, for once, is measured in inches. He holds Otabek’s hand, holds Otabek’s gaze, and murmurs, “Will you kiss me, Beka?”

There’s a gleam of something new in Otabek’s eyes.

“I have wanted to, for a long time.”

He bends down and kisses the laughter in the corner of Yuri’s lips, and they share it in the wisps of nonexistent breaths between lips.

And Otabek, finally, drowns himself in gold.

**\-----o0o-----**


End file.
